Chuck Sweeny: Where are the Greens? They're still here, sorta

Wednesday

Feb 12, 2014 at 3:53 PMFeb 12, 2014 at 3:53 PM

What happened to the Green Party in Illinois?

In 2006 the liberal, ecologically friendly party was on the statewide ballot, and the Greens' candidate for governor, Rich Whitney, got 361,336 votes, or 10.4 percent of the total. The Register Star endorsed him because we thought he was superior to either Democrat Rod Blagojevich or Republican Judy Baar Topinka.

"We can't deny that our endorsement of Whitney is in part because of our dissatisfaction with the current system, but the Green Party candidate's positions on the issues make him a viable candidate," our editorial said.

In the 2010 election, Whitney again was the Green candidate for governor; he got 99,625 votes or 2.7 percent of the total.

Since then, the Green Party hasn't been on the ballot in most of the state because its ticket-leading candidate didn't get at least 5 percent of the vote in the 2010 election. But the party still exists; Illinois Greens have members on two city councils, Galesburg and Carbondale, two school boards, two park boards and four library boards, none in the Rockford area.

Gerry Woods, a Machesney Park Green, ran twice against state Rep. Dave Winters in the 2008 and 2010 elections. Woods says politics has taken a back seat in his life since then.

"Both times I ran against Winters I got the Chicago Tribune endorsement. ... The last time I also got the Rock River Times endorsement," he said. Woods got about 4 percent of the vote in 2008 and 6 percent in 2010, he said. (Winters has since resigned his seat, which is now held by Machesney Park Republican John Cabello.)

"I had two disappointments in those races. I thought I would attract people who otherwise wouldn't vote, but I couldn't get them to register," said Woods, a Xerox service engineer for 30 years and an Air Force veteran.

Another locally based Green Party candidate in 2010 was David Black, an attorney who lives in Belvidere. He ran against Attorney General Lisa Madigan, a Democrat; he got just 2.16 percent of the vote, according to Illinoiselectiondata.com.

"Our platform hasn't changed," Black said Tuesday, naming "fracking, income distribution, corruption issues, how the pension crisis was solved. We're concerned with economic justice and civil liberties." And Black said Greens don't want the U.S. getting involved in more overseas wars.

One of the reasons the two major parties give against voting for a third-party candidate is that you'll throw your vote away.

Black counters: "If you find a candidate who you really agree with, you're wasting your vote voting for the Democrat or Republican, because they'll continue doing the things you don't like."

According to the Illinois Green Party's website, ilgp.org, the Greens are looking for candidates for statewide office. Currently they have congressional candidates on the March 18 primary ballot in two congressional districts, the 5th in the Chicago area and the 12th in the metro east area, as well as three candidates for the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District of Greater Chicago.

As you can see, the Greens in Illinois aren't exactly catching fire. What's happening to them is what happens to all third parties in the U.S. - they melt into one of the two main parties. Greens' policies are similar to the Democratic Party, which has veered left in recent years. Libertarians have migrated into the Republican Party as it has become more conservative. However, Libertarians disagree with Republicans on social issues like drug policy and on foreign affairs. Libertarians tend to be isolationists.